ATLANTA, Sept. 12, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Internap Network Services Corporation (NASDAQ: INAP), a provider of intelligent IT Infrastructure services, today announced that its Dallas data center has been awarded LEED Gold certification by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC). LEED is one of the primary rating systems for the design, construction and operation of energy-efficient buildings. A Gold certification is given for buildings that are designed and constructed with sustainable concepts and practices that substantially reduce the building's impact on the environment as compared to other, similar facilities.

"In the technology sector, green data center design and construction is critical for long-term sustainability," said Rick Fedrizzi, president and CEO of the U.S. Green Building Council. "Internap has pursued LEED certification for a number of its data centers by optimizing energy efficiency and reducing environmental impact. We congratulate Internap for its leadership and for achieving LEED Gold certification at its Dallas facility and LEED Silver certification earlier this year at its data center in Santa Clara."

In addition to receiving LEED certification, Internap's Dallas facility became the first commercial data center in Texas to achieve the Green Building Initiative's Green Globe® certification in February 2012. The high-reliability, high-density facility provides comprehensive IT Infrastructure services – including managed, dedicated and cloud hosting, colocation and a global, performance-optimized IP network, backed by a 100% uptime Service Level Agreement. Opened in December 2011, the state-of-the-art data center serves customers with 55,000 square feet of net-sellable floor space that incorporates efficient design and operational practices from the ground up. In addition to LEED and Green Globe certifications, Internap is working toward Energy Star certification at its Dallas data center.

Water conservation – Internap reduced potable water use to nearly 40% below the recognized American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) standard.

Energy efficiency – More than 90% of Internap's appliances, computers, monitors and printers are Energy Star compliant. In addition, Internap achieved a lighting power reduction of 27% below the recognized ASHRAE standard, in part by establishing occupancy sensors and individual lighting controls for users.

Improved indoor air quality – Internap used low-emitting materials throughout the construction of the facility, as well as Green Housekeeping and Green Pest Control Services.

Access to public transportation – By utilizing an existing facility in a previously developed area, Internap provides public transit opportunities to its employees and clients. Public transportation helps reduce air pollution and dependence on foreign oil by reducing the use of fossil fuels in cars.

Existing Infrastructure – Internap's choice to renovate an existing facility reduces urban sprawl. By utilizing an existing building, Internap used the embodied energy of the materials in place and by doing so, reduced the energy required to dispose of, manufacture, transport and assemble a new facility.

Recycled Materials – Nearly 20% of the new building materials used in renovations were manufactured with recycled materials. Additionally, Internap was able to avoid sending almost 85% of its overall construction waste to landfills, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and the building's impact on the environment.

"With energy costs and carbon emissions on the rise, the demand for green computing practices continues to grow. Internap is committed to green data center design – wherever possible, we employ building practices that maximize energy efficiency and reduce our dependence on fossil fuels and other natural resources in our facilities," said Randy Ortiz, vice president of data center design and engineering at Internap. "Our achievement of LEED Gold and Green Globe certifications at this facility will assure customers that we have employed advanced steps to reduce our carbon footprint and boost efficiencies for power usage and cooling for their ultimate benefit."

Today, Internap also announced that it was ranked in the top 100 in the 2012 InformationWeek500 list of top technology innovators for its sustainability and energy reduction initiatives at its Santa Clara, Calif. data center. The facility is LEED certified and was the first commercial data center in the U.S. to achieve GBI's Green Globe certification.

About Internap Internap provides intelligent IT Infrastructure services that combine unmatched performance and platform flexibility to enable our customers to focus on their core business, improve service levels and lower the cost of IT operations. Our unique trio of route-optimized enterprise IP, TCP acceleration and a global content delivery network improves website performance and delivers superior end-user experiences. Our scalable colocation, hosting, private cloud, public cloud and hybrid offerings provide enterprises the flexibility to adapt to changing business needs and future-proof their IT Infrastructure. Since 1996, thousands of companies have entrusted Internap with the protection and delivery of their online applications. Transform your IT Infrastructure into a competitive advantage with IT IQ from Internap. For more information, visit http://www.internap.com, our blog at http://www.internap.com/blog or follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/internap.

Forward-Looking StatementsThis press release contains forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements include statements related to the performance of our IT Infrastructure services and the benefits that our customers and the communities in which they live may receive from them, including the environmentally friendly characteristics of our data centers. Because such statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve risks and uncertainties, there are important factors that could cause our actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. These factors include the actual performance of our IT Infrastructure services; our ability to successfully integrate Voxel, including its products, portal, services and employees, into our company; the reaction and behavior of customers and the market to our combined company; our ability to react to trends and challenges in our business and the markets in which we operate; the availability of services from Internet network service providers or network service providers providing network access loops and local loops on favorable terms, or at all; failure of third party suppliers to deliver their products and services on favorable terms, or at all; failures in our network operations centers, data centers, network access points or computer systems; our ability to provide or improve Internet infrastructure services to our customers; and our ability to protect our intellectual property, as well as other factors discussed in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Given these risks and uncertainties, investors should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements as a prediction of actual results. We undertake no obligation to update, amend or clarify any forward-looking statement for any reason.